Texas native Wes Anderson has made a name for himself as a novel producer, writer, and director whose signature style involves quirky characters in vintage duds, spectacular voyages, and an emphasis on the artifice of filmmaking. He met Owen Wilson while in college, and he has frequently collaborated with Owen and his brother Luke ever since.
Anderson has been nominated for a handful of Academy Awards, and he won a Golden Globe for his 2014 film The Grand Budapest Hotel. He continues to make movies that are as full of contrived, staged circumstances as they are genuine, relatable characters. This juxtaposition makes him one of the most interesting filmmakers in recent decades. The list pulls together Anderson's best and Anderson's worst movies, ranked by their scores on IMDb.
10 Worst: The Royal Tenenbaums (2004) - 7.6
Anderson's third feature has a lower rating than others, but it's still considered a whimsical, moving family drama that includes memorable performances from its ensemble cast.
Owen Wilson also co-wrote the screenplay, which digs in the lives of the Tenenbaums, whose patriarch, Royal, abandoned the family when his children were young. Years later, with his finances dwindling, he plots an awkward reunion with his estranged kin. The film stars Gene Hackman, Angelica Huston, Bill Murray, Gwyneth Paltrow, Ben Stiller, Luke Wilson, Owen Wilson, and Danny Glover.
9 Best: Rushmore (1998) - 7.7
Anderson followed Bottle Rocket up with this beloved comedy, which he co-wrote with Owen Wilson. Jason Schwartzman stars as 15-year-old Max Fisher, a sophomore at Rushmore Academy who has a hard time making friends. He develops a peculiar connection with an older man, business tycoon Herman Bloom, played by Bill Murray.
Their friendship is compromised, though, by their mutual love for a grade school teacher named Miss Cross. This film solidified Anderson's status as an up-and-coming director, and it launched Schwartzman's career.
8 Worst: The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou (2004) - 7.3
Despite inspiring innumerable Halloween costumes, The Life Aquatic is considered one of Anderson's worst films. Co-written with fellow quirky movie man Noah Baumbach, the film follows oceanographer Steve Zissou as he seeks vengeance on the jaguar shark that ate his colleague Esteban.
Bill Murray plays Zissou, equal parts Captain Ahab and Jacques Cousteau, as he leads his crew on an ill-fated adventure. The Life Aquatic has an impressive supporting cast, including Cate Blanchett, Angelica Huston, and Jeff Goldblum, but it's seen by many as too hip for its own good. Rich characters and relatable emotions are sacrificed for chicness and panache.
7 Best: Isle Of Dogs (2018) - 7.9
Wes Anderson's second foray into animated moviemaking, Isle of Dogs was both critically and theatrically successful. Made with stop-motion technology, Isle of Dogs is a dystopian dog flick about life on an island all dogs are quarantined to after an outbreak of dog flu.
With voice acting from celebrities as diverse as Bryan Cranston, Ken Watanabe, Tilda Swinton, and Harvey Keitel, the movie bridges the gap between younger audiences in search of feel-good stories and older audiences who enjoy Anderson's artistic approach to animated films.
6 Worst: The Darjeeling Limited (2007) - 7.2
Considered one of Anderson's weaker features, The Darjeeling Limited follows three estranged brothers on a train ride through India. The brothers are played by Owen Wilson, Adrien Brody, and Jason Schwartzman.
While the film has a compelling story, it tends to rely on many of the same thematic elements that made Rushmore and The Royal Tenenbaums so loved. Some filmgoers left a screening of The Darjeeling Limited feeling as if they'd seen something derivative.
5 Best: The Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009) - 7.8
Also co-written with Noah Baumbach, The Fantastic Mr. Fox turned out to be much more successful than their first collaborative effort, The Life Aquatic. Anderson's first stop motion animated feature follows a fox family whose way of life is threatened when three local farmers try to run them out of their hovel.
Entertaining and intelligent, The Fantastic Mr. Fox employs the voices of George Clooney, Meryl Streep, Bill Murray, Owen Wilson, and Willem Dafoe.
4 Worst: Bottle Rocket (1996) - 7.0
Despite having one of the lowest ratings compared to other Wes Anderson films, his debut feature Bottle Rocket is technically very fresh by Rotten Tomatoes standards. This idiosyncratic indie comedy is based on a short he made with Owen and Luke Wilson.
Considered by Martin Scorsese to be one of the best films of the 1990s, Bottle Rocket tells the story of a group of young Texans trying to make a living for themselves as thieves. James Caan plays the older con man who takes the burgeoning robbers under his wing.
3 Best: Moonrise Kingdom (2012) - 7.8
This beautiful, wacky story about first love could only occur in a universe created by Wes Anderson. In this film's case, that universe is the made-up New England island New Penzance, where a pair of youngsters become pen-pals, fall for each other, and plan to run away together.
Yet another ensemble film, Moonrise Kingdom stars everyone from Bruce Willis to Frances McDormand to Edward Norton. The actors who play the young lovers, Sam and Suzy, make anyone with a heart swoon over their pure and innocent desire for each other.
2 Worst: She's Funny That Way (2015) - 6.1
Anderson produced this film, written and directed by 60s and 70s cinema icon Peter Bogdonavich. It carries the worst rating of any film attached to Anderson's name.
This ensemble rom-com stars Owen Wilson, Jennifer Aniston, Will Forte, Imogen Poots, and Kathryn Hahn. Wilson plays a Broadway director who hires a call girl and then gives her financial incentives to turn her life around. The film's strange and heteronormative undertones are never balanced out by even a few good laughs, and the movie never really comes together.
1 Best: The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014) - 8.1
This sweeping, ensemble historic drama is framed and untangles in a way only Wes Anderson could pull off. The action of the movie takes place in the fictional European country Zubrowka during the 1930s, and the social and political upheaval that serves as a background mirrors the events of World War II.
While the cast includes Anderson's regular band of collaborators, it also includes performances by Ralph Fiennes, Saoirse Ronan, and Willem Dafoe. Fiennes plays Gustave H., a famous concierge who runs the eponymous hotel located in the Alps. After he's implicated in the death of his long-time mistress, a much older woman played by Tilda Swinton, a cast of characters with nefarious intentions comes after him.
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